A group of tech companies with a history of protecting user privacy is calling for a ban on “surveillance-based advertising.”
Mojeek, along with DuckDuckGo, Ecosia, StartPage, Fastmail, Proton Technologies and others have written a letter calling on the US, UK, EU and Australia to take action against the dominant form of online advertising. Mojeek is a UK-based search engine that has not tracked users since its inception, and holds the distinction of being the first privacy-oriented search engine. Similarly, the other companies on the list have a long history of protecting user privacy.
The companies make the case in their open letter that surveillance advertising, commonly called “personalization,” is a threat to consumers, businesses and democracies. The companies also stand as examples that prove it’s possible to build a profitable business without exploiting consumers.
We are a group of businesses who write to you today to show our support to this initiative. We represent small, medium and large businesses who all believe -and demonstrate on a daily basis -that it is possible to run profitable companies without exploiting the privacy of individuals.
The companies emphasize they are not anti-advertising, they simply want the industry to use technologies and methods that don’t involve invading the privacy of users.
Although we recognize that advertising is an important source of revenue for content creators and publishers online, this does not justify the massive commercial surveillance systems set up in attempts to “show the right ad to the right people”.
Other forms of advertising technologies exist, which do not depend on spying on consumers, and alternative models can be implemented without significantly affecting revenue. On the contrary – and that we can attest to – businesses can thrive without privacy-invasive practices.
Google has introduced multisearch in an effort to make it easier for people to find what they’re looking for.
Multisearch is deisgned to combine images and text to help people find things that would otherwise be hard isolate. The new feature is built into the Google app on both Android and iOS.
With multisearch, you can ask a question about an object in front of you or refine your search by color, brand or a visual attribute.
The feature can be used to find something based on a photo, or learn more about the item. Google says AI is responsible for the innovative feature.
All this is made possible by our latest advancements in artificial intelligence, which is making it easier to understand the world around you in more natural and intuitive ways. We’re also exploring ways in which this feature might be enhanced by MUM– our latest AI model in Search– to improve results for all the questions you could imagine asking.
Chinese search giant Baidu has been warned it may be delisted as a result of audit concerns.
Baidu is the dominant search engine in China, and is currently listed on the Nasdaq. Unfortunately for Baidu, its listing is in jeopardy, with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) putting the company on a provisional list of companies that face delisting under the Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act (HFCAA).
Companies are put on the provisional list when “the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (“PCAOB”) has determined that it is unable to inspect or investigate completely because of a position taken by an authority in the foreign jurisdiction.”
Once a company is put on the provisional list, it has 15 business days to contact the SEC staff and provide evidence to support why it should not be delisted. In the case of Baidu, the deadline is April 20, 2022.
Should Baidu fail to appeal its placement on the provisional list, or fail to convince the SEC it should remain on the Nasdaq, its delisting will likely exacerbate the US/China trade issues.
Google is the latest company to halt its business in Russia, announcing it is pausing ad sales in Russia in response to that country’s invasion of Ukraine.
As has already been well-documented here and elsewhere, companies across industries are imposing their own sanctions on Russia in response to its invasion of Ukraine. The idea is to make Putin’s decision so costly and inconvenient that it will force Russia to change course.
“In light of the extraordinary circumstances, we’re pausing Google ads in Russia. The situation is evolving quickly, and we will continue to share updates when appropriate,” said spokesperson Michael Aciman.
Google and French newspapers have reached a licensing deal, ending a long-term dispute.
Google has long-maintained that it shouldn’t have to pay for news that it links to and uses. The company has argued that publishers benefit far more than it does, a point most publishers vehemently disagree with.
The French Competition Authority had previously fined Google a record $593 million over its failure to negotiate in good faith with publishers.
According to Reuters, the company has finally reached a deal with newspaper publishers, bringing their dispute to an end.
The agreement “sets out the principles under which Google will negotiate individual license agreements and terms of remuneration with Alliance members,” read a statement from Google and the publishers.
Online ads may be on the verge changing significantly, with Google testing favicons within ads.
Favicons are those little icons that show up in browser tabs when visiting certain websites. They’re a way for websites to add a little more branding, but many users find them annoying and distracting. What’s more, browser favicons have been exposed as a privacy risk, allowing bad actors to track users’ activity.
Evidently, Google still believes favicons may have a place in advertising, and is testing their inclusion, according to a tweet by Google’s AdsLiason account.
This is part of a series of small experiments to help users more easily identify the brand or advertiser associated with the Search ads they may see for a given query.
Google has unveiled a dedicated ‘Desktop’ section in the Page Experience reports of its Search Console.
Google had already rolled Page Experience for mobile, but is now adding the feature for desktop, and will soon use it as part of its desktop ranking system.
We’ll begin using page experience as part of our desktop ranking systems beginning in February 2022. The rollout will be complete by the end of March 2022. This ranking launch will be based on the same page experience signals that we rolled out for mobile earlier this year. We are also planning to help site owners understand how their desktop pages are performing with regards to page experience using a Search Console report which will launch before desktop becomes a ranking signal.
To help companies prepare for the changes, the company has provided additional information to help them optimize their sites.
DuckDuckGo is making major headway in the search market, growing by 46% in 2021 and averaging more than 100 million daily searches.
DuckDuckGo is a privacy-focused search engine that does not track or profile its users, unlike Google or Bing. The company does rely on advertising, but those ads are based solely on the keywords and content of a specific search.
While the company’s market share pales in comparison to Google, it is solidly in fourth place, behind Google, Bing, and Yahoo. According to Bleeping Computer, DuckDuckGo saw its searches go from 23.6 billion in 2020 to 34.6 billion in 2021. That translates to a daily average in 2021 of 100 million, up from 79 million in 2020.
Obviously, DuckDuckGo still has a long way to go before it represents any real threat to Google, but the company continues to prove that profits don’t have to come at the expense of user privacy.
Amazon has dethroned Google in product searches with over 54 percent of all product searches now happening on Amazon instead of Google. What this means is that brands must make Amazon SEO their priority in order to show up near the top of product searches for their related keywords.
It’s predicted that an entire industry is in the midst of emerging to help companies adjust their strategies similar to what happened when Google first started to dominate search a couple decades ago.
We have seen a shift from Google to Amazon. Today over 54 percent of all the product searches that occur on the entire internet now occur on Amazon. Once you get into Amazon we’ve seen a strong growth in the number of sponsored placements that they put on their site. The product views that emanated from a sponsored click has increased from 3 percent to 7 percent in the last 18 months.
We think that Amazon and Google are converging. We did some additional analysis at Jumpshot that shows that from the time a consumer searches on either Google or Amazon to the time that they buy was actually much shorter on Google. On Google, 35 percent of those purchases were made within 5 days, only 20 percent on Amazon.
Amazon Becoming a Place for Product Discovery
What you are seeing is that Amazon is becoming a place for product discovery for customers more and Google is shifting from pure product discovery to more of that considered purchase. When people are interested in understanding the price or the quality or the brand name they’re going away from Amazon back to Google now.
Once you get to Amazon, 90 percent of the product views are actually the result of a search. So people aren’t messing around with merchandising placements or banner ads, they are typing a search for a product into Amazon and getting a search result. Once they get that search result we found that over two-thirds of the clicks are on the first page.
Amazon SEO is Now More Important than Google SEO for Brands
Imagine if you are a brand, you know that the majority of your customers are now searching for your product on Amazon. You know that once people get to Amazon what they are doing really doing is typing in a product search. Then once you get that search result you’ve got your competitors products, Amazon’s private label products, and you have to decide whether you are going to try and increase your organic results or pay for a sponsored placement. It’s a very confusing world for a brand today.
I would not want to be a brand manager at a CPG company right now because I think you are between a rock and a hard place. I think what you will see in the future is the same way that an ecosystem of companies sprung up around Google search when it started to dominate peoples online behavior, you are going to see the same thing for Amazon search. What people are going to need is a non-Amazon source of information to help them understand what they are supposed to do and how they are supposed to spend their advertising dollars.
Google has been labeled a company of “paramount significance” by the German antitrust watchdog, opening the door for more scrutiny.
Google is facing scrutiny and legal challenges worldwide over antitrust concerns related to its search dominance, advertising business, and its Android operating system.
According to SFGATE, Google’s designation was changed by the Bundeskartellamt, the German antitrust group, allowing it “to intervene earlier and more effectively” to block anti-competitive behavior. The classification lasts for five years.
“This is a very important step, since based on this decision, the Bundeskartellamt can now take action against specific anti-competitive practices by Google,” said the watchdog’s president, Andreas Mundt.
Google has already said it will not appeal the decision.
“We are confident that we comply with the rules and, to the extent that changes are necessary, we will continue to work constructively with the (Federal Cartel Office) to find solutions that enable people and businesses in Germany to continue to use our products,” Google said in a statement.
If you avoid these seven online marketing mistakes and you follow these tips you’re going to generate more sales, says popular digital marketing expert Neil Patel. A common theme of Neil’s tips is creating a brand. “Google doesn’t want to rank sites that aren’t brands,” he says. “There’s an issue out there called fake news and that’s why they’re pushing brands over anything else.” Patel says that if you follow these tips you’re going to crush it!”
Neil Patel, digital marketing expert and founder of Neil Patel Digital, discusses the seven online marketing mistakes in his latest video release:
Stop Making These 7 Online Marketing Mistakes
I’m going to break down seven online marketing mistakes that you need to stop. You’re probably wondering you’re doing all these things but why aren’t you seeing results? Even if you’re doing the right things, if you’re also doing the wrong things at the same time it’s going to hurt you and it’s going avoid you from getting the results that you deserve.
Mistake 1: Not Collecting Emails
The first mistake you are making is not collecting emails. It doesn’t matter how good you are with SEO or marketing only a very small percentage of your visitors are ever going to convert into customers. By collecting emails not only can you get people to come back to your site but you can convince them to convert over emails.
The moment someone gives you their email address think of that as a micro-commitment. They’re much more likely to convert into a customer because they committed, they already gave you something. That’s why you want to collect emails. You can do this through sliders or exit pop-ups. You can do this for free using tools like Hello Bar.
Mistake 2: Not Collecting Subscribers Through Push Notifications
The second mistake you’re making is you’re not collecting subscribers through push notifications. There are free tools like Subscribers.com that’ll make it easy. Just add in a JavaScript or a WordPress plug-in and then when people come to your website they will automatically subscribe through the browser. Then anytime you have new content or products or services that you want to sell then you can notify them through Subscribers.
Mistake 3: Not Building a Brand
The reason tip number one on collecting emails and tip number two on getting more push notifications subscribers are really important is because you need to build a brand. This gets you into the third mistake. Google doesn’t want to rank sites that aren’t brands. Why is this? There’s an issue out there called fake news and that’s why they’re pushing brands over anything else. It’s not just going to be Facebook and in Google. Eventually, it’s going to be Twitter and LinkedIn and all the sites out there.
When you get people back to your site seven times you’re much more likely to build a brand. It’s called the Rule of Seven in marketing. So with your site, you want to provide an amazing user experience. When you provide an amazing user experience, create a great product, create a great service, it’ll help you build a great brand over time.
Mistake 4: Not Interlinking
The fourth mistake you’re making is not interlinking. You may notice on Google I’m ranking for terms like online marketing on page one. You’re probably wondering how do I do this? A lot of it comes out to interlinking. In my sidebar, I link to my most popular pages of content. When I write blog posts related to online marketing I link back to the online marketing guide that talks about what online marketing is. By having all these links it helps me rank higher.
Mistake 5: Just Focusing On Text-Based Content
The fifth mistake I have for you is just focusing on text-based content. The future of digital marketing is moving to video. It doesn’t mean you should stop doing text but it means you should also be doing video. When you do video you’re going to get more traffic because everyone’s lacking it. LinkedIn wants it right now. YouTube wants more of it. Facebook wants it. Instagram even wants it.
Why is this? They want to crush the television networks. You look at things like the Oscars or traditional movie theaters and they’re not doing as well. You look at traditional TV and they’re going to get crushed. Why? It’s because of Facebook. It’s because of Google. It’s because of Netflix. If you’re there creating that video content you can be part of it and you’re going to get extra traffic. They want as much help as possible to crush these big old-school companies.
Mistake 6: Sticking To Just a Few Marketing Channels
The sixth mistake that you’re making is you’re really sticking to just a few marketing channels. Marketing is competitive. People raise venture capital hundreds of millions of dollars just so they can compete in marketing and sales. You need to do more than one or two or three marketing channels. The more you do the better off you’re going to be.
Mistake 7: Not Asking For the Sale
The seventh mistake I have for you is not asking for the sale. Whether it’s a lead or whether it’s getting people to buy your product, there’s nothing wrong with asking people to buy from you. If you don’t you’re not going to generate any sales. Everyone’s like I get all this traffic through my online marketing but no one’s converting. Why? Because you’re not asking for a sale.
Stop Making These 7 Online Marketing Mistakes and You Will Crush It, Says Neil Patel
Google Ads was down Tuesday evening, impacting a large number of users.
Users started experiencing issues with Google Ads Tuesday evening. The company acknowledged an issue impacting its users.
We’re aware of a problem with Google Ads affecting a significant subset of users.
Just under three hours later, the company said the problems was fixed.
The problem with Google Ads has been resolved. We apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience and continued support. The affected users are able to access Google Ads, but may not have access to the most recent data.
DuckDuckGo has revealed details about its upcoming desktop web browser, a new entry that promises to offer significant privacy protections.
DuckDuckGo has made a name for itself as a search engine that protects user privacy and security. The company has been branching out into application development, offering mobile apps and desktop browser plugins that further support its mission.
The company is now working on its own desktop web browser that will further protect user privacy.
Like we’ve done on mobile, DuckDuckGo for desktop will redefine user expectations of everyday online privacy. No complicated settings, no misleading warnings, no “levels” of privacy protection – just robust privacy protection that works by default, across search, browsing, email, and more. It’s not a “privacy browser”; it’s an everyday browsing app that respects your privacy because there’s never a bad time to stop companies from spying on your search and browsing history.
One of the benefits of DuckDuckGo’s browser is that it will use the default rendering engine of its host platform, rather than creating yet another fork of Chrome.
Instead of forking Chromium or anything else, we’re building our desktop app around the OS-provided rendering engines (like on mobile), allowing us to strip away a lot of the unnecessary cruft and clutter that’s accumulated over the years in major browsers. With our clean and simple interface combined with the beloved Fire Button from our mobile app, DuckDuckGo for desktop will be ready to become your new everyday browsing app. Compared to Chrome, the DuckDuckGo app for desktop is cleaner, way more private, and early tests have found it significantly faster too!
DuckDuckGo’s entry into the market is an exciting development for anyone concerned with protecting their online privacy.
Google appears to be having an issue with Search Console, as many users are reporting trouble accessing it.
It’s been a bad couple of weeks for outages, with AWS reporting two different issues that impacted a wide range of websites and service. Now Google appears to be having some issues of its own, with users having trouble accessing the Google Search Console, according to Search Engine Land.
Google has acknowledged the issue and says they are working on a fix.
We're aware of an issue with Search Console that prevents some users from using the service. We're working on fixing it and we'll post an update when the issue is resolved. ^gi
Microsoft Bing has added a major new feature, making it possible for users to search local stores.
Many consumers use search engines to research products and find local places to purchase them. In many cases, consumers will purchase a product online and then pick it up in person.
Microsoft is looking to help facilitate this by making it possible for consumers to search local stores’ inventory and product availability.
The company announced the new feature in a blog post.
You need something from a specific store. Where is the location closest to your home? Are they open? Is your product in stock? Using Microsoft Bing or searching on Bing Maps, you will get rich results that will answer all these questions!
For consumers looking to spruce up their homes for the holidays Bing search provides local results for what is needed, as well as inspiration for what is possible. By searching for new table lamps on Bing Maps, results show store stock, expanded views of products at the stores, and even include store reviews. This helpful level of information can motivate and confirm purchase decisions, helping shoppers spend time and money wisely.
SEO pioneer and Moz co-founder Rand Fishkin was recently asked about the future of SEO and how SEO agencies and marketers should adjust to these changes. Rands says that SEO has changed to the point that the traditional SEO focus on generic related keywords for your products and services is becoming obsolete because of how Google now displays search results.
See below for highlights from Rand’s thoughts on the changing SEO landscape:
There is definitely this problem in the SEO space where the amount of opportunity in SEO (is lessened), because of Google entering all these business sectors and taking away of a lot of the clicks and trying to solve the searchers’ query before they ever click.
This means that you just don’t have as much opportunity to earn search clicks from this search engine anymore.
Branded Search Queries
How can we overcome that? I think the answer in SEO is pretty clear, which is the one thing that Google is not taking away from us, branded search queries. If somebody searches for StatBid or they search for Moz or they search for the North Face, that is a searcher telling Google to take me to this companies website. That’s a very very powerful undeniable signal that they want to reach your site. You’re getting 90% plus click-through rates on those.
If you can increase the number of people searching for your brand instead of drawing a smaller and smaller percentage of the people who search for outdoor jackets, because Google’s placing all these ads above the fold and trying to say these are the best outdoor jackets and having an instant answer and a featured snippet and all this type of stuff, yeah that’s that’s a big win.
Combining Classic SEO with New Stuff
I think for CMO’s and for marketing departments it’s going to be a combination of classic skill sets in SEO. First, how do we rank? How do we make sure that our site is technically optimized? How do we make sure that we’re doing good keyword research and keyword targeting? How do we create good content around all these things and solve searchers problems?
Then I think it’s also going to be some new forms of marketing that SEO’s are not generally familiar with, at least not historically. Those are things like creative that draws attention and eyeballs and interest. I think it’s a lot of storytelling. Great brands are built on the back of great storytelling and that is traditionally a big weak spot for SEO.
SEO Teams Need to Get Retooled
So yeah, I think there’s going to be a combination of new and old. That could mean that some (SEO & marketing) teams need to get retooled or new people need to be added. It could mean that agencies will have to upgrade those practices and I’ve already seen some agencies in the SEO world start to do that. I think serving existing demand is going to long-term not be as exciting as creating more demand.
After you stop making these 5 deadly SEO mistakes your google traffic is going to increase, says digital marketing expert Neil Patel. Sometimes just making a simple change can dramatically increase your traffic. For instance, Patel says that the moment he took out the dates from his URL his search traffic shot up 58 percent in just 30 days.
Neil Patel, digital marketing expert and founder of Neil Patel Digital, discusses the five beginner SEO mistakes in his latest video release:
Mistake 1: Putting Dates in URLs
The first mistake is putting dates in your URL. I used to do this with NeilPatel.com. What a huge mistake. My URL structure used to be NeilPatel.com/year/month/TitleofmyBlogPost. The moment I took out the dates from my URL guess what happened to my search traffic? Within 30 days it went up by 58 percent. I’m not talking about taking my search traffic from a 1,000 visitors to you 1,580 visitors. I had hundreds and thousands of visitors from Google already each month with dates in my URL. The moment I removed them I saw an additional 58 percent increase in my search traffic.
So whatever URL structure you have just make sure it does not have dates. Reason being is when you have a date in your URL, Google thinks of your site as being relevant to that date. You write a blog post and they’re like oh, this blog post must be related to January 12, 2025, or whatever the date is today. If you want your content to continually rank as evergreen content you can’t put dates in your URL.
Mistake 2: Thinking of Your Site as a Silo
The second mistake that you’re making is you’re thinking of your site as a silo. It doesn’t matter how many different sections you have or categories, it’s still one site. It’s on one domain name. For example, my blog is about marketing, so when I create content I link to all the other marketing posts (on my site) that are relevant to the posts that I just released.
You should consider thinking of your website as one big site versus different silos so when you write content you should link to other pieces of content that are relevant. That way all of your pages are going to be interconnected and they’re going to rank higher.
Mistake 3: Thinking of SEO as Just SEO
The third mistake that you’re making is you’re thinking of SEO as just SEO. It’s not just about on page code. It’s not just about building links. It’s not even just about getting social shares. It’s about building a brand. Eric Schmidt, the ex-CEO of Google, once said that brands are the solution. What he’s talking about is that when Google was trying to figure out what sites to rank higher than others he decided as well as ton of other people in Google that if you have a brand you should rank higher.
Why is that? You’ve heard of this thing called fake news. It’s a great way to combat that. It’s not just Facebook who’s concerned about fake news. It’s also Google, LinkedIn, Twitter, and all of the major platforms out there. Building a brand does wonders for you especially when it comes to SEO. You can do things like collecting emails to get people to keep coming back to your site. You can use tools like HelloBar to do that for free. You can use tools like Subscribers to do push notifications so that when people come to your website within one click they can subscribe. Getting all of those people to keep coming back will help reinforce your brand to them. That’ll help you climb in the rankings in the long run.
Mistake 4: Just Writing Content
The fourth mistake is just writing content. I know you’re that content is king, how is that a mistake? Writing content isn’t a mistake. It’s writing content and then not updating it, and that’s what most people do. They just write content and they write more new content then after that they write more content and guess what they do after that they write more new content. If you update your content Google’s going to see it as fresh, hip, new, and still relevant, and rank it higher.
With over a billion blogs out there Google likes picking brand new updated content versus old outdated content. This doesn’t mean you have to rewrite the whole article. It could just be paragraph or two or a few lines. It could just be reviewing an article and making sure it’s still up to date where you make no modifications because it’s still good to go.
Mistake 5: Not Thinking About the User
The last mistake you’re making is not thinking about the user. Google looks at something called user metrics. Whether it’s the browser or the toolbar Google wants to make sure people have an amazing experience. They’re using all those platforms to track how and when people come to your website and how they perceive it.
They can’t talk to them by serving them or anything like that. What they can see is when someone performs a Google search, clicks on the listing landing on your site and within a second they are they clicking the back button. If they are it tells Google your website or that web page isn’t relevant. By putting the user first instead of putting SEO first it’ll help you climb to the top.
Google has joined the $2 trillion club, becoming only the third US company to cross the threshold, thanks to a surge in its stock price.
Apple was the first company to cross $2 trillion in valuation, in August 2020, followed by Microsoft in June of this year. According to TheStreet, a surge in Google’s stock price Monday helped the search and ad giant cross over.
Despite a great deal of hand-wringing over Apple’s various privacy initiatives, the ad industry in general, and Google in particular, has managed to survive relatively intact.
Google’s valuation shows there’s still plenty of money to be made in the advertising industry, while still respecting user privacy.
Yahoo is the latest US company pulling out of China, citing an “increasingly challenging business and legal environment.”
China has been cracking down on the tech industry and making it difficult for foreign companies to compete. The country also has a long history of internet censorship. As a result, a number of high-profile companies have announced plans to leave the market, including LinkedIn and Epic.
According to Associated Press, Yahoo has now joined their ranks and announced it will no longer offer services in mainland China beginning November 1.
“Yahoo remains committed to the rights of our users and a free and open internet. We thank our users for their support,” the statement read.
The future of Google and of SEO is AI says world-renowned SEO expert Stephan Spencer. “If you’re relying just on backlinks, then you aren’t recognizing that the future of Google and of SEO is AI, it’s artificial intelligence,” noted Spencer in another informative interview by James Schramko of SuperFastBusiness.
Stephan Spencer, SEO expert, speaker, and author recently discussed the impact of AI on Google Search and SEO with James Schramko of SuperFastBusiness: (Listen to the full podcast below)
The Future of Google and SEO is AI
If you’re relying just on backlinks, then you aren’t recognizing that the future of Google and of SEO is AI, it’s artificial intelligence. What’s the best way, or the really the only way, to outsmart an AI? I would challenge that the only way to outsmart an AI is with another AI. So really, AI is the future.
AI and nanotechnology and all the cool technologies that are advancing, like VR, AR, etc., they’re happening faster and faster. And we need to be more nimble than we’ve ever been in order to keep up. So that’s kind of the game that we have to play.
SEO is Not Just About Machine Learning and AI
But right now, SEO is not just about having machine learning on your side to try and outsmart Google. It’s about having a search-engine-friendly website. It’s about identifying keywords that are relevant and popular and that are attainable for you in the Google search results. And it’s about achieving buzz and link equity by having people mention you and link to you. So those things still work, they’re still important to the Google algorithm. But on top of that, you’ve got to be willing to explore machine learning and be nimble about the future.
I’m personally excited about the future. I think it’s an amazing time to be alive. The kinds of advances that we’re about to experience in our lifetimes are going to be mind-blowing.
Australia may soon force Google to give users a choice for their default search engine on Android phones.
Google has come under increased scrutiny for its dominance in the search market. While the company argues that its dominance is the result of simply being better, critics say its overwhelming market lead all but ensure it faces no real competition. Add in aggressive deals with other companies, as well as its ability to make its search the default on Android, and Google’s position is all but unassailable.
According to Reuters, Australia wants to change that by forcing Google to present users with a screen during initial configuration that will allow users to choose their default search engine. While it is already possible to change the default on Android, less tech-savvy users may not readily know how, something a selection screen would solve.
“We are concerned that Google’s dominance and its ability to use its financial resources to fund arrangements to be the default search engine on many devices and other means through which consumers access search, such as browsers, is harming competition and consumers,” said Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) Chair Rod Sims in a statement.
“Google pays billions of dollars each year for these placements, which illustrates how being the default search engine is extremely valuable to Google’s business model.”
